Just 20 More Years
by starwarsfreak95
Summary: Fang is going back to meet Max. While they are there, something terrible happens. I'm really bad at summaries, better than it sounds.


**Author's Note: I know that this is depressing, but I got an incredibly random idea and wanted to follow through with it before I lost it. Thanks for putting up with my randomness! I'm also sorry it's been so long since I posted anything, my computer had virus, and my story was on it. I'm also going to take a short break from my story Secret Wings. I need some inspiration. If anyone who read the story has any ideas, PM me.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Maximum Ride or the song Just a Dream by Carrie Underwood.**

Fang POV

I knew that I would be the first to die, Angel had said so and Angel was never wrong. I wasn't the praying type, but I prayed every day. Max probably hated me, I hated myself at times. I loved her. Because of this, I prayed every day for 20 more years, 19 more years, 18 more years, until the day came.

I had a premonition when I woke this morning. It was dark and shadowy in the cave and when I woke up and realized what day it was, a chill passed over me. I felt it in every bone in my body-something tragic was going to happen today.

I walked out to wait for the reason I prayed. Max. I wasn't sure if she would come. I knew she was still alive, but she might not come. Every time I saw a dark fleck in the sky, my heart would jump. Then I would be disappointed as I realized it to be one of the hawks that still lived here 20 years later. Then, late in the afternoon, I saw a dark speck that was oddly shaped. My heart jumped again as I realized it to be a bird kid. I didn't want to get my hopes up, she still may hate me.

Finally, she landed, and I got my first look at her in 20 years. She was older. Not just physically, but you could see in her eyes that she was more mature than she had been before I left. I wouldn't have said it was possible without seeing it with my own eyes, but she was. And I had the feeling that it was partially my own fault. We stared at each other, re-memorizing each other's faces. Her blondish-brown hair was short, but long enough to wave in the breeze. Her brown eyes, accented by brown wings and a smattering of freckles, were warm and loving. She didn't hate me now. She may have at the beginning, but not anymore. Her style hadn't changed much, the only un-Maxish things she was wearing were an old looking necklace made of string, bones, and shiny bits of metal. The other made me gasp in surprise. It was the ring I had given her for her 15th birthday. The fact that she was still wearing it made me sure it was safe to run over and put my arms around her.

"Oh Fang!" she cried, and began weeping into my shirt.

I softly whispered her name over and over again in her ear, rocking us back and forth softly and rubbing her back.

When her crying had subsided she simply looked up at me and smiled. A vulnerable smile, something before I would have only seen as she slept. Then she kissed me and I lost all sense of time and place.

A little while later we were telling our stories. After telling hers, she gave me a chance to explain my self.

"I know this is going to sound empty, but I'm going to start off with I'm sorry." Then I proceeded to tell her about my last 20 years without her. It was a sad story of someone who was reckless enough to get badly hurt, over and over, but never dying. There was no way I could die, because I needed to come back to Max.

She listened silently and I noted idly that I almost missed her argumentative personality. I figured that after the novelty of my returning wore off, she would be back to normal again.

After I had finished, we sat in silence for a while.

"I forgive you, you know," she said finally, "I forgave you years ago."

"Thank you, I wish I could tell you how sorry I am though."

A small sound made us look up. I felt the blood drain out of my face when I recognized the adversaries hanging several yards above us. The Flyboys were back!

"I thought they were all gone," I said to Max quietly.

"Me too," she replied.

Then they converged on us. We fought until they were all dead. These last years had honed our fighting skills instead of softening them as the remnant whitecoats had obviously hoped, as they had only sent a couple dozen. But it only takes one.

She laughed, that was more like my Max, "Ha! Losers! Thought you could take down two lean mean flyboy tail-kicking' machines! Well you thought wrong!"

I smiled sadly at her, "Oh, Max."

She turned sharply at the tone of my voice. Her eyes filled with tears.

"Oh, Fang, No!" she'd seen it. The dark hole in my chest that my life was leaking out of.

"I got what I wanted," I told her.

"And what was that? Death?" she almost shouted.

"No, of course not. What I have been praying for, ever since I left, is 20 more years. All I wanted in life was to see you again, and I did. I can die happy now. Not for leaving you alone, but because I saw you again."

"No, Fang, No! Don't leave me again! You died on me, you left me, don't rip me apart again!"

She was supporting me now, holding a shred of shirt to my wound, trying to keep my life inside. I smiled at her again and whispered,

"Don't worry, you'll be happy again."

"How?" she cried, "If you die, I'll be just as dead!"

The blackness was trying to claim me, I was ready to let it. She saw this on my face.

"No! Fang!" she screamed, "I love you! You can't leave me now! Fang!"

"I love you Maximum," I said as the darkness claimed me.

Max POV

Fang's head went limp as he said those last words.

"No!" I screamed with all my heart. I had just gotten him back, I wasn't giving him up yet.

I tied the scrap of shirt to his chest, and began CPR. The only thing I could think as I did it was that his lips shouldn't be this cold. I could feel the tears streaking tracks in the dust on my slightly dirty face.

I watched as I did CPR and realized that all it was doing was blowing and pumping his remaining blood out of his wound. Once I realized what I had done, I howled with grief, knowing that he was beyond saving now.

_Get yourself together Maximum, _I told myself, _the others still need you as a leader. You lived without him for 20 years, you can do it again._

I stared at the face that I loved. The olive skin and silky black hair that I always had the urge to sweep out of his face. I stroked one of the black wings that, depending on the amount of sunlight, could be anything from a flat, unfriendly black, to a deep violet. I closed his eyes with my fingertips. The eyes that always seemed to smolder when he was near me, even in the dark. I wanted something of his to keep with me forever.

I went through his jeans pockets and found his wallet. I opened it to see a driver's license with his picture on it. I slipped it into my back pocket, and continued my search.

Then I saw it. There was a bulge in his jacket pocket. I reached in and brought out a small box and a piece of paper. I opened the box and gasped at the item inside. It was a ring. It had a gold band with one simple small diamond on it. If I'd ever wanted to get married, this would be my choice of ring.

Then I opened the much folded piece of paper. As I began reading, I realized what it was. It was a speech. Well practiced by the look of the paper. Tears filled my eyes as I looked at the familiar, rough handwriting.

"Max, I know we haven't seen each other in 20 years," it began,

_but I think we better do this before something else happens. (get on one knee) Maximum Ride, I love you, and I want you to do me the honor of consenting to be my wife._

At that moment, I realized how much he cared about me. He loved me so much, he was willing to accept the fact that I would turn him down. He was ready to marry me. I also realized that I would have said yes without a second thought.

A few days later I was at the funeral. It was huge. I put out the word on his blog, and the readers pored in. I knew that they deserved the chance to say goodbye just as the flock did.

I was wearing a white dress, and the ring that he had meant for me on my left hand. I was the last up to talk to everyone, I wanted to wait until everyone had already said what they wanted to say. While this would usually have left me having a panic attack, I was oddly peaceful as I walked up to the podium.

"My name is Maximum Ride. I probably knew Fang better than anybody. He was my right wing man, my second in command. I was taking care of 4 other kids, and he was the only one I felt that I could go to pieces with and he not doubt me. After he died in my arms, I noticed something in his jacket pocket. I pulled it out and saw that it was a piece of paper, and a small box. After reading the piece of paper and looking in the box, I gathered that the object in the box was for me. He was going too propose. This is why I'm wearing white to his funeral, to honor his last request. I'm also going to sing you a song." I nodded at the DJ to begin the song that was perfect for what had happened.

_It was two weeks after the day she turned 18_

_all dressed in white, going to the church that night_

_She had his box of letters in the passenger seat, six pence in her shoe_

_something borrowed something blue_

_and when the church doors opened up wide she put her veil down trying to hide the tears oh_

_she just couldn't believe it _

_she heard the trumpets from the military band and the flowers fell out of her hands_

_Baby, why'd you leave me, why'd you have to go_

_I was counting on forever, now I'll never know_

_I cant even breathe_

_It's like I'm, looking from a distance, standing in the background_

_Everybody's saying, he's not coming home now, This can't be happening to me _

_This is just a dream_

_The preacher man said let us bow our heads and pray_

_lord please lift his soul and heal this hurt_

_then the congregation all stood up and sang the saddest song that she ever heard _

_then they handed her a folded up flag and she held on to all she had left of him oh and what could've been _

_and then guns rang one last shot and it felt like a bullet in her heart_

_Baby, why'd you leave me, _

_why'd you have to go_

_I was counting on forever, now I'll never know_

_I can't even breathe_

_It's like I'm, looking from a distance, standing in the background_

_Everybody's saying, he's not coming home now, _

_This can't be happening to me This is just a dream_

_Oh,Oh Baby, why'd you leave me, why'd you have to go_

_I was counting on forever, now I'll never know_

_Ohh I'll never know_

_It's like I'm, looking from a distance, standing in the background_

_Everybody's saying, he's not coming home now, This can't be happening to me _

_This is just a dream_

_Oh this is just a dream_

_j__ust a dream, oh!_

As the last notes drifted up into the air, I led the procession out. Only the close family were allowed to see the gravesite. We drove to the old house in Colorado, the one Fang and I designed. We went to the backyard where there was already a hole dug, and a headstone carved. It said, "Fang" on it and underneath it said, "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death" and on a whim, I had finished it with what Fang had ended all his blog posts with, "Fly on."

I hadn't cried during the ceremony, but as they lowered my best friend, my confident, my love into the ground, I reached, blind with tears to find a hand to hold. I dimly saw Nudge and Gazzy together, Nudge crying into his shoulder, he into her hair. Angel was holding hands with Dylan, who was technically younger than all of us, tears streaking down her face. And then someone wrapped their arms around me, letting me cry into their dress shirt. I also felt a slight wetness in my hair, so I assumed that the person holding me was crying too.

I looked up at the face in my hair and found myself nose to nose with Iggy. The good scientists found out a way to grow organs from existing tissue. They had replaced Iggy's sightless eyes with eyes grown from his own DNA. Eyes that could see. I was struck with the depth of concern for me shining in the tears and sadness in his eyes.

"I'm not going to fail them again," I told him, "I let go a long time ago. I loved him with all my heart, but he wouldn't want me to mope around. He'd probably kick my butt if I did. I will be strong."

I looked at the grave that was rapidly being filled with dirt. An idea suddenly struck me. I went inside and found a large empty plastic box. I had left every memory of Fang in this house when we left, I didn't want to be bothered with him. I'd taken everything of his off the computer and put it on a jump drive. I took this jump drive, the computer(we didn't use it anymore), and everything else Fang and put it in the box. I went back outside, and asked the gravediggers to dig a smaller hole on the other side of Fang's grave.

Startled, they complied. The hole was very small. The others gathered around it and watched with large, sad, eyes.

"This is a time capsule," I told them, "We are going to put Fang in this capsule, and in 10 years we will gather here and open it. Does anyone have anything else that you want to put in?"

Angel put her camera in. She had others, but this one reminded her of Fang because he had given it to her. The others wrote notes to Fang or put similar things in. Lastly, I put in the speech he was going to say to me to ask me to marry him, and a small ring box.

"What's in the box, Max?" Gazzy asked.

"Take a look," I took the box and held it open for them to see. It contained my birthday ring, and my engagement band.

They all filled with tears at the site of me putting the ring box in the container and capping it. As we buried it, I felt a calming peace settle over me. Fang did love me, and whatever I chose to do with my life he would support. Like I had told Iggy, he would kick my butt for moping around. I smiled through my tears. It _would_ be okay. I knew it.

Ten years later I stood at the same place. Angel and Dylan had gotten married and their first child had been a beautiful turquoise eyed, white-winged 6 year old girl, that they named Ariel. Nudge and Gazzy had also gotten married, and they had a boy and girl twin set. They were 8 years old, blonde with mocha colored skin, named Matt and Maddelyne. I looked over at my husband, and smiled. Then went back to watching the rambunctious little strawberry blond 5 year old with brown eyes.

My eyes narrowed as he went too far away, "Nicholas Fang, you get back here this instant!"

"Yes, Mommy, " he had an impish look in his eye that reminded me of his father.

"He looks so much like you," Iggy commented.

"I was about to say the same thing, but about you."

"He has your willful, leaderly nature and eyes."

"but your mischievous glint in them and your hair, " I retorted.

"Isn't it time to get started?" Angel asked.

"That's fine. Can you call the kids?"

All four of the kids stopped in their tracks as they got the psychic message from Angel. They came and gathered around me, I was to be the story teller today. The adults crowded around the outside of the circle to hear.

I took the freshly dug up box from beside me, and began.

"Many years ago in a science lab, a small, dark haired boy was thrown into a cage next to a little girl. The boy's name was Fang."


End file.
